Wednesday, November 5, 2008

You call this balance, what balance?

When driving half asleep to work this morning, it didn't occur to me that I could really take some time off and get over my lack of sleep from watching the elections. After working more than fifty hours each week, as well as enduring an eighty minute commute each day, being burned out is inevitable - but you see, my work has something we call 'Alternate Work Schedule'(AWS), meaning, you rest every other Friday. Some people take advantage of this, while others see it as an opportunity to close their office doors and continue where they left off without interruption. This proves true of a study that says sixty-four percent of workers feel that their work pressures are 'self-inflicted'. True? Yup!

The big 'Bank' has a work-life balance as a mandate, staff are also encouraged to go to school if they want to - so at the end of the day, I say to myself, "I earned my share of stress today, I worked very hard for it, and no one, no one, is going to take it away from me', ha ha.

Umou

Umou is from Sierra Leone, West Africa. She comes from a family of 34 brothers and sisters. She drew her calmness out of the madness of growing up with a huge family.

Earning her BA from Marymount University, she currently works at the External Affairs Communication Unit at the World Bank. She is with the training team which manages the 'strategic communication' trainings at the Bank.

She earned her BA from Marymout University.

2 comments:

Susan said...

Umou--do most people take their free Friday, or is there pressure to work anyway? And do the free Fridays mean you work longer days Mon-Thur?

43-44 said...

Same question here.

I have that every other Friday-off "luxury" but as everything in this world, it has a price...

I need to work 1 more hour a day for two weeks to make up for the Friday I am out.

It is nice being out, feels weird sometimes. When I wasn't enrolled in the Friday-off deal I do the extra hours anyways since I needed to get work done.

Juana Merlo